Pope Benedict XVI's unprecedented announcement today that he will resign Feb. 28 brings to a close one of the shortest papacies in history, for which the pontiff will leave a legacy as a leader with views in line with church tradition, but also as one who worked during a controversial reign to advance religious links cross the globe.

The pope's decision, which he announced in Latin today during a meeting of Vatican cardinals, makes him the first pontiff to resign in nearly 600 years. It was perhaps the most shocking moment of his nearly eight years as leader of the world's roughly 1 billion Catholics, years in which he worked on religious outreach.

"I think he deserves a lot of credit for advancing inter-religious links the world over between Judaism, Christianity and Islam," Israeli Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger's spokesman said today. "During his period, there were the best relations ever between the church and the chief rabbinate and we hope that this trend will continue."

Horst Seehofer, minister-president of the German state of Bavaria, where Benedict was born as Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger 85 years ago, echoed the sentiments about his work for the greater good, adding that Benedict had a global reach.

"With his charisma and his tireless work for the good of the Church, the Pope from Bavaria has inspired people all over the world," he said.

Such global reach and efforts to reach the masses resulted recently in a new Twitter account, which the Vatican launched in late-2012. But true to his traditional worldview, he cautioned the world's Catholics at his Christmas 2012 Mass about the risk of technology's pushing God out of their lives.

"The faster we can move, the more efficient our time-saving appliances become, the less time we have. And God? The question of God never seems urgent. Our time is already completely full," he said.

Benedict XVI was the oldest pope to be elected at age 78 on April 19, 2005. He was the first German pope since the 11th century and his reign will rank as one of the shortest in history at seven years, 10 months and three days.

The last pope to resign was Pope Gregory XII, who stepped down in 1415.

Vatican officials said they've noticed that he has been getting weaker, while Benedict said he is aware of the significance of his decision and made it freely.

He was widely seen as a Catholic conservative who was in line with the politics of his predecessor, Pope John Paul, and Russian Orthodox Church spokesman Dimitriy Sizonenko pointed out today that the Vatican is unlikely to move away from that tradition.

"There are no grounds to expect that there will be any drastic changes in the Vatican's policies," he said.
"In its relations with Orthodox Churches, the Roman Catholic Church has always ensured continuity between Popes."

Benedict did court controversy, memorably with his speech in September 2006 at the University of Regensburg, in which he quoted a remark about Islam by Byzantine Emperor Manuel II Palaiologos that some of the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad are "evil and inhuman."

A number of Islamic leaders around the world saw the remarks as an insult and mischaracterization of the religion. Mass protests ensued, notably in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Benedict soon apologized.

John Thavis, former Rome bureau chief for the Catholic News Service and author of an upcoming book about the Vatican called "Vatican Diaries," said Catholics will remember him as a gentle and very deep teacher.

"I think the outside world will probably have a different impression of this pope," he said. "I think they will remember him as someone who probably found it hard to govern the church in the face of the scandals that the church has experienced over the last several years."

During his papacy, Benedict was forced to address accusations that priests had sexually abused boys, a scandal that hit in the United States more than a decade ago and soon spread across Europe.

As the Catholic church was rattled by such allegations, the Vatican published "Criteria for the Discernment of Vocation for Persons with Homosexual Tendencies."

It was widely viewed as the church's response to the worldwide scandal, but was also criticized for drawing a connection between pedophilia and homosexuality.

In 2008, the pope said the clergy sex abuse scandal in the United States made him feel "deeply ashamed." In 2010, Benedict apologized directly to victims and their families in Ireland.

"You have suffered grievously and I am truly sorry," he wrote to victims of child sex abuse by clergy in Ireland.

Benedict had plenty of critics during his papacy over what was perceived as archaic views on contraception. In March 2009, he commented that condoms are not the solution to the AIDS crisis, and can make the problem worse. He revised the comments in 2010, saying that male prostitutes who use condoms might be taking a first step toward a more responsible sexuality.

More controversy came in 2010, when, in what is seen as a gesture to traditional Catholics, Benedict removed restrictions on celebrating the old Latin Mass. The old rites include a Good Friday prayer for the conversion of Jews.

The year 2012 brought the "Vatileaks" scandal in which Benedict's former butler Paolo Gabriele was convicted of stealing the pope's private papers from his apartments and leaking them to a journalist, who published them in a best-selling book. Gabriele was sentenced to 18 months in an Italian prison.

Speaking today, Cardinal Donald Wuerl Archbishop of Washington said the pope's willingness to step aside is a sign of character

"I think it's a sign of the great humility of this pope and his love of the church and his courage," he said.

The role Benedict will play in retirement, as well as any enduring legacy of his brief but busy papacy, might be his love for the church, his humility or his courage. Or, perhaps, it has yet to be clearly understood.

The Pope's Life

As for his road to the Vatican, Ratzinger started seminary studies in 1939 at the age of 12. In his memoirs, he wrote of being enrolled in Hitler's Nazi youth movement against his will when he was 14 in 1941, when membership was compulsory. In 1943, he was drafted into a Nazi anti-aircraft unit in Munich. He says he was soon let out because he was a priest in training.
He returned home only to find an army draft notice waiting for him in the fall of 1944.

As World War II came to an end, the 18-year-old Ratzinger deserted the army. In May 1945, U.S. troops arrived in his town and he was sent to a prisoner-of-war camp.

In his memoir, he says that he became convinced God "wanted something from me, something which could only be accomplished by becoming a priest."

"I was shy and unpractical, had no talent for sports or organization or administration," he wrote. "I had to ask myself if I would ever be able to connect with people."

Ratzinger later recalled that during this dark time the church served as "a citadel of truth and righteousness against the realm of atheism and deceit."

Wunderkind Theologian

After the war, Ratzinger returned to the seminary where he was known to play Mozart on the piano. He and his older brother, Georg, were ordained priests June 29, 1951. Three years later, he received his doctorate in theology from the University of Munich and began teaching in Bonn, the first of several appointments in German universities.

Chosen as an adviser to the Second Vatican Council in 1962, when the church became more open under Pope John XXIII, Ratzinger was a progressive voice in updating church laws on heresy.

Hans Kung, the Swiss theologian, was so impressed by Ratzinger's intellect that in 1966 he brought him on as staff at the University of Tubingen, without interviewing other candidates, a practice unheard of in German universities.

But the radicalism he encountered there bothered him. He opposed the 1968 Marxist student demonstrations and left the university for his native Bavaria to teach at a more conservative university.

"I had the feeling that to be faithful to my faith I must also be in opposition to interpretations of the faith that are not interpretations but oppositions," he later said.

It was during the 1970s that Ratzinger explored his deepest theological thoughts.

In 1977, Ratzinger was appointed bishop of Munich and elevated to cardinal three months later by Pope Paul VI. He was one of only two cardinals in the latest conclave who were not chosen by John Paul II.

That same year he was appointed to the Synod of Bishops, an advisory council to the pope, and met the archbishop of Krakow, Karol Cardinal Wojtyla, the future Pope John Paul II.

They found they were both intellectual, multilingual church men despite their different styles: a soft-spoken, polite Bavarian vs. the athletic, media loving anti-Communist Pole.

When Wojtyla was elected pope in 1978, he invited Ratzinger to Rome.

After overcoming Ratzinger's objections, John Paul named him to head the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith as guardian of church dogma.

A Vatican spokesman acknowledged that some papal appointments were influenced by politics but Ratzinger was "one of the most personal choices" of John Paul's pontificate.

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Ratzinger later became the Vatican official responsible for reigning in dissident clergymen like his old mentor Kung, whose license to teach theology was revoked by the Vatican in 1979.

He explained that during Vatican II he began to have second thoughts about the new direction the clergy was taking.

"I found the mood in the church and among theologians to be agitated," he wrote. "More and more there was the impression that nothing stood fast in the church, that everything was up for revision."

A conservative on issues such as homosexuality and the ordination of women, Benedict also denounced rock music, dismissed anyone who tried to find "feminist" meanings in the Bible, and denied Communion to those who supported abortion and euthanasia.

As his stances hardened, the nicknames piled on from "God's Rottweiler," to "the German Shepherd" to "Cardinal No."

As John Paul II's health declined, Ratzinger took over more and more responsibility at the Vatican. In 2002, he became dean of the College of Cardinals, which didn't seem to slow down his prolific writing.

The pontiff authored more than 30 titles including: "Pilgrim Fellowship of Faith: The Church as Communion," "Truth and Tolerance: Christian Belief and World Religion," "The Spirit of the Liturgy" and "Milestones: Memoirs 1927-1977."

Benedict's Election

In the days after Pope John Paul II's death April 2, 2005, the shy and humble Ratzinger stepped into the spotlight. He delivered a heartfelt homily at John Paul's funeral followed by a fiery speech to the cardinals.

Before the cardinals started the secret process of choosing a successor, he warned them about tendencies that he considered dangers to the faith: sects, ideologies like Marxism, liberalism, atheism, agnosticism and relativism -- the ideology that there are no absolute truths.

"Having a clear faith, based on the creed of the church is often labeled today as a fundamentalism," he said. "Whereas relativism, which is letting oneself be tossed and swept along by every wind of teaching, looks like the only attitude acceptable to today's standards."

Despite thoughts that his conservative penchant would keep him out of the running, Ratzinger's election to St. Peter's throne was swift.

His election in four ballots in two days was one of the shortest in 100 years. He is also the oldest pope elected since Clement XII in 1730.

Pope's Namesake

If Ratzinger was paying tribute to the last pontiff named Benedict, it could be interpreted as a bid to soften his image as "God's Rottweiler." Benedict XV reigned during World War I and was credited with settling animosity between traditionalists and modernists, and dreamed of reunion with Orthodox Christians.

The name he took draws a connection to Benedict XV, the Italian pontiff from 1914 to 1922 who had the difficult task of providing leadership for Catholic countries on opposite sides of World War I. His declared neutrality and humanitarianism was demonstrated in his untiring efforts to relieve the sufferings of the war.

He founded a bureau for the exchange of wounded prisoners and a missing-persons bureau and established relief agencies.

Benedict was also known for his outreach to Muslims and efforts to close the nearly 1,000-year estrangement with Christian Orthodox churches.

Taking on the Papal Role

In his homily after assuming the role of pope, Pope Benedict XVI told the faithful, "The Church is young." As a cardinal known for his strict orthodoxy, Benedict struck a softer note. He said he did not need to lay out a governing program.

Immediately after the Mass, a white Jeep pulled up to the steps of the basilica, and Pope Benedict XVI climbed in. There was no bulletproof glass as he drove around for what was described as a victory lap.

In his first weeks as Pope, Benedict pledged to work for reconciliation and peace among peoples.

He also referred to the Christian roots of Europe, in what was a major theme of his papacy.

In his only visit to the United States as pope,
Benedict was welcomed for an elaborate state visit arrival at the White House in 2008. President Obama was granted an audience at the Vatican just months after taking office, although the Obama administration and the church have clashed on important issues, including abortion, contraceptive services, and stem cell research.